Capital City Carvers

Info on Woods for Carving

This information is adapted from Carving Magazine, Isssue #1. This great magazine is no longer published.

Basswood (linden, lime wood) is the most common material used by wood carvers. It is a softer wood, which makes it easier to carve, and has a fine grain, which holds detail. Its fine grain makes it ideal for a refined portrait as well as a great choice for a highly detailed caricature carving. Its light color makes it ideal for a wide variety of finishing techniques as well as painting or woodburning. Options other than basswood may be white poplar, ginkgo, cottonwood or aspen.

When considering a wood for outdoor use, catalpa, cedar, cypress, tamarack, redwood, white oak, mahogany, and teak work well. When considering a wood for a stylized piece or a piece that will show movement, woods such as butternut or catalpa have a grain structure that enhances movement. A medium hardwood such as black walnut makes an

excellent carving wood because of its tight grain. It has the ability to hold detail over extended use and cleaning. It is much harder to carve than basswood.

Butternut (also known as white walnut) is soft and has a grain structure that can pass for walnut when a walnut stain applied. Catalpa carves and looks similar to butternut. White pine and sugar pine have slightly coarser grain than basswood but also carve well. They are soft and have the ability to hold detail. Jelutong (rubber tree) has a color and softness similar to white pine with a more refined grain. Honduras mahogany is another excellent carving wood just slightly harder then pine. It has an excellent grain structure that holds detail well. Wild black cherry is hard but is excellent for holding detail with its fine grain structure.

Birch is another excellent choice in a hard wood because of its fine grain and its ability to hold strong details. Tupelo is a softer wood with excellent fine grain.

Ash, red oak, white oak, maple and hickory are generally considered either too hard or too heavy in grain structure for carving. Black willow and sycamore are mores choices to consider for a softer wood with a fine grain structure.

Hundreds of other woods are used for wood carving, such as juniper, mesquite, apple, pear and exotics from Central and South America, Africa, Indonesia, and New Zealand. They are also harder to carve.

Since this article was published in 2003, two other woods, usually classified as "found woods", have become very popular. Cottonwood bark and cypress knees each have their strengths (visually pleasing) and weaknesses (don't hold detail well).